The Delivery and Contrast of Patriotism
patriotized history
core myths
wausfpp.org
The Delivery and Contrast of Patriotism |
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A list of recurrent items in the category core myths: |
Definition of core myths
Recurrent items in the core myths diagram element categoryThis tiny set of five core myths covers all historical propaganda in patriotic texts. On the left is the list of these core myths. Clicking on any one of them will take you to a discussion of that myth and examples of texts that use it.
The notion of core myths in the work of Herman and ChomskyThe idea that there are certain key myths that patriotic texts can't violate is not new to us. Propaganda analysts Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky have advanced this idea (in various terms) for at least three decades. They speak of "the selective processes of the mass media that do not allow serious criticism of patriotic myths and untruths, with a brainwashing effect comparable to that of systems with explicit government censorship" (1979, 79). They use other terms for these core myths as well: "fundamental premises" any challenge to which "will be excluded from the mass media" (1988, xii), "the unquestioned framework for further reporting and discussion" (1988, 185), "the bounds of the thinkable" (1988, 186), "the presuppositional framework of the doctrinal consensus" (1988, 305). They point out that the mass media "permit--indeed, encourage--spirited debate, criticism, and dissent, as long as these remain faithfully within the system of presuppositions and principles that constitute an elite consensus, a system so powerful as to be internalized largely without awareness" (1988, 302). They speak of "the media's pervasive, docile, and unthinking acceptance of a set of patriotic assumptions" (1988, 186). Whether Herman and Chomsky would agree with our notion that the five we indentify as the core are in fact the most important myths or "presuppositions" is another question. They never (to our knowledge) explicitly lay out their position on which myths constitute the core. But their work is full of references that make it quite clear (in our opinion) that our notion of which myths constitute the core follows theirs quite closely. Consider the following passages, which, taken together, identify a core set to which at least the first four of our five myths closely correspond: --"the framework of established dogma (postulating benevolent U.S. aims, the United States responding to aggression and terror, etc.)" (1988, xiv). --"the uncritical acceptance of certain premises in dealing with self and friends--such that one's own state and leaders seek peace and democracy, oppose terrorism, and tell the truth--premises which will not be applied in treating enemy states" (1988, 34). --"the required image of aggrieved benevolence" (1988, 245) --"the alleged goal of 'defending freedom' developed in official propaganda and relayed by the ideological institutions" (1988, 247) --"standard reference to 'protecting' the victims'" (1988, 329). --"One crucial doctrine, standard throughout history, is that the state is adopting a defensive stance, resisting challenges to order and to its noble principles. Thus, the United States is invariably resisting aggression, sometimes 'internal aggression.' . . . [examples from propaganda texts talking about the US in South Vietnam] Cultivated opinion generally has internalized this stance. Accordingly, it is a logical impossibility that one should oppose U.S. aggression, a category that cannot exist" (1989, 49) --"A related doctrine is that 'the yearning to see American-style democracy duplicated throughout the world has been a persistent theme in American foreign policy,' as a New York Times diplomatic correspondent proclaimed after the U.S.-backed military government suppressed the Haitian elections by violence, widely predicted to be the likely consequence of U.S. support for the junta. These sad events, he observed, are 'the latest reminder of the difficulty American policy-makers face in trying to work their will, no matter how benevolent, on other nations.'[Neil Lewis, NYT, Dec. 6, 1987] These doctrines require no argument and resist mountains of counter-evidence. On occasion, the pretense collapses under its manifest absurdity. It is then permissible to recognize that we were not always so benevolent and so profoundly dedicated to democracy as we are today. The regular appeal to this convenient technique of 'change of course' over many years elicits not ridicule, but odes to our unfailing benevolence, as we set forth on some new campaign to 'defend democracy.'"(1989, 49-50) Or consider the following paragraph from Chomsky and Herman's Washington Connection and Third World Fascism, written almost 30 years ago: ". . . the Chinese were established by the mass media as 'expansionist,' while the United States, engaged in the wholesale destruction of a distant small country on the border of China, with bases around China, and supporting Chiang and Taiwan, was responding to China's aggressiveness, preventing dominoes form falling, protecting freedom, etc. Rarely was the United States portrayed in the mass media or mainstream academic scholarship as engaged in the positive pursuit of its own economic-imperial interests at the expense of any people standing in its way; nor are its exploits described as subversion or outright aggression" (1979, 68). (This paragraph shows Chomsky and Herman's awareness of the US media's adherence to all of the core myths we identify except the law-abiding myth.) Sources for the Herman and Chomsky quotes above are: Chomsky, Noam and Edward S. Herman. 1979. The Washington Connection and Third World Fascism. The Political Economy of Human Rights: Volume I. (Boston: South End Press). Herman, Edward S. and Noam Chomsky. 1988. Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (New York: Pantheon Books). Chomsky, Noam. 1989. Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies (Boston: South End Press). |
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